Lebanon, Hezbollah agree to US proposal for ceasefire with Israel

A top Lebanese official told Reuters Monday that Lebanon and Hezbollah have agreed to a US proposal for a ceasefire with Israel, but have some comments on the content, describing the effort as the most serious yet to end the fighting.

There was no immediate comment from Israel.

A truce would come some two months into an Israeli offensive against the Iranian-backed terror group, which has attacked Israel daily since last October. Since the offensive was launched, Hezbollah has seen its leadership devastated and its arms supply greatly reduced.

Ali Hassan Khalil, an aide to Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, told Reuters that Lebanon had delivered its written response to the US ambassador in Lebanon on Monday, and confirmed that White House envoy Amos Hochstein was traveling to Beirut to continue talks.

Hezbollah endorsed its long-time ally Berri to negotiate over a ceasefire.

“Lebanon presented its comments on the paper in a positive atmosphere,” Khalil said, declining to give further details. “All the comments that we presented affirm the precise adherence to (UN) Resolution 1701 with all its provisions,” he said.

Khalil said the success of the initiative now depended on Israel, saying if Israel did not want a solution, “it could make 100 problems.”

Hochstein delayed his departure to Lebanon earlier Monday, waiting for clarifications from Beirut on the Lebanese response to the most recent proposal. According to Axios, he received a response two hours later that convinced him to make the trip.

If the negotiations in Beirut are successful, Hochstein will travel to Israel on Wednesday, Axios said.

According to the Ynet news site, the US believes there’s a greater than 50% chance a deal will be reached, though numerous outlets quoted officials from the United States, Lebanon and Israel cautioning that this wasn’t certain.

A leaked draft of the US proposal published by the Kan public broadcaster earlier this month calls for full enforcement of UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which was passed in 2006 to end the Second Lebanon War and calls for Hezbollah to disarm and withdraw its forces north of the Litani River.

The most recent draft includes a 60-day transition period in which the Israel Defense Forces would withdraw from southern Lebanon, the Lebanese military would deploy close to the border, and Hezbollah would move its heavy weaponry north of the Litani, Axios reported.

AFP reported Monday that Beirut had largely endorsed the draft, and was preparing final comments before sending a response to Washington. The news agency quoted a government official who has been following the talks closely, saying: “we have made a lot of progress. Lebanon has a very positive view on this proposal.”

“We are finalizing our last remarks about the US wording of the draft,” the official added, according to AFP. Another government official reportedly said Beirut was “waiting for US special envoy Amos Hochstein to arrive so we can review certain outstanding points with him.” Both sources said Israel had not yet responded to the truce plan.

Reuters reported that Beirut had already submitted a written response to the draft.

The reports came after US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said Monday that the Biden administration was “making progress” toward an agreement, but declined to give more specifics.

According to Axios, the matter of which countries will make up an international committee to oversee the agreement’s implementation, and the matter of Israel’s freedom to operate in southern Lebanon even after it has formally withdrawn, remain contentious, as was previously reported.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed the efforts to reach a ceasefire in Lebanon, and indicated that Israel would need to continue to operate militarily against the Iran-backed terror group Hezbollah even if a deal is reached.

“The most important thing is not [the deal that] will be laid on paper,” Netanyahu said. “Even if there is a paper [setting out an agreement], worthy though it may be, we will be required, in order to ensure our security in the north (of Israel), to systematically carry out operations - not only against Hezbollah’s attacks, which could come. Even if there is a ceasefire, nobody can guarantee it will hold. So it’s not only our reaction, a preventive reaction, a reaction in the wake of attack, but also the capacity to prevent Hezbollah from strengthening.”

“We will not allow Hezbollah to return to the state it was in on October 6, 2023,” he stressed.

Over the course of the speech, Netanyahu repeatedly criticized the Biden administration’s judgment and policies at major junctions in Israel’s ongoing war against Iran and its proxies, both against Hezbollah in Lebanon and against the Hamas terror group in the Gaza Strip, whose October 7, 2023, attack started the war.

Beginning the day after the start of the Hamas attack, Hezbollah-led forces have attacked Israeli communities and military posts along the northern border on a near-daily basis, with the group saying it is doing so to support Gaza.

Hezbollah has since expanded its attacks to also target cities in central and northern Israel with rockets, in addition to the attacks on the border, though in recent days the IDF has seen a decrease in the number of attacks.

Some 60,000 residents were evacuated from northern towns on the Lebanon border shortly after Hamas’s October 7 onslaught, amid fears Hezbollah would carry out a similar attack, and increasing rocket fire by the terror group.

The attacks on northern Israel since October 2023 have resulted in the deaths of 44 civilians. In addition, 70 IDF soldiers and reservists have died in cross-border skirmishes and in the ensuing ground operation launched in southern Lebanon in late September.

Two soldiers have been killed in a drone attack from Iraq, and there have also been several attacks from Syria, without any injuries.

The IDF estimates that some 3,000 Hezbollah operatives have been killed in the conflict. Around 100 members of other terror groups, along with hundreds of civilians, have also been reported killed in Lebanon.

Source: Anadolu Agency